Shahrukh Khan is said to have cut the cost of tickets to Rs 100, which will be available apart from the Rs 220, Rs 335, and Rs 665 tickets.

Ticket sales for the Knight Riders versus Deccan Chargers match will open on April 15, 2008.

Kolkata Knight Riders Sport expect great demand for the Knight Rider matches. Meanwhile, Indian ex-Captain Saurav Ganguly is back in Kolkata after the 3-match test series versus South Africa. Saurav will take part in the Kolkata Knight Riders’ practice match on April 15, 2008.

IPL launch ceremony to be a visual extravaganza

IPL’s inaugural ceremony will be held in Bangalore’s Chinnaswamy stadium where SRK’s Kolkata Knight Riders will play their first match with Dr.Vijay Mallya’s Bangalore Royal Challengers. Representing the star power at the match, will be SRK’s close friends Farah Khan, Karan Johar, Juhi Chawla, and Arjun Rampal.

The inaugural ceremony will include a visually opulent show. The show, modeled on international lines, will have aerial acrobatics, pyrotechnics, and bubble dancers spinning in eight giant transparent bubbles in the colors of the eight teams. Acrobats and dancers have been hired from US, UK, and Europe, for the show.

The Washington Redskins, current world champion cheerleading squad of the American National Football League, will be flown down for the show. The launch show will also have a Spirit of Cricket segment that will have the eight captains come together in solidarity.

This segment will be followed by a laser show. A spectacular fireworks display has also been planned for the end of the show. Shankar, Ehsaan, Loy will perform at the event. Star performers will include Katrina Kaif, Zayed Khan, Shilpa Shetty, Upendra, and Ramya.

Former BCCI President Jagmohan Dalmia is in deep trouble after the Economic Offences Wing of Mumbai Police reportedly found documents that could implicate him for allegedly misappropriating Rs 2.90 crore from a BCCI account opened in connection with the Cricket World Cup in 1996.

Jagmohan Dalmia has denied any involvement in the scam.

The account was opened in Indian Overseas Bank’s Bhowanipore branch in West Bengal and Jagmohan Dalmia was authorized to operate it. The 1996 world cup was jointly hosted by India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

In 2006 Sharad Pawar became Board president. The account was closed that year, but BCCI had asked Dalmia to provide a statement of funds used from that account.

But there was no account of the expenses maintained in BCCI office during Dalmia’s tenure, reports said.

According to the contract, IPL must respect international schedules and not take on players that do not have board clearance to take part in IPL.

This would include players who have been retired for up to two years, said a report in The Australian.

FICA chief executive Tim May has said that ICC’s attempts to prevent players from retiring to take part in the IPL could lead to legal action.

The ICC has said that the concept of nation-versus-nation cricket was the “lifeblood” of the game and must always be given the highest possible priority. The statement has come in the wake of the impending Australian tour to the West Indies.

Three West Indies players Chris Gayle, Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Ramnaresh Sarwan may not be able to play in most of the test series because of their IPL commitments.

Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) vice-president Rajeev Shukla confirmed the deal saying, “Pepsi has been signed as the official drink sponsor of the upcoming IPL and the deal has been closed.”

PepsiCo has been associated with cricket, domestic and international, for a long while now. Pepsico is already a global sponsor of the International Cricket Council (ICC) till 2015 having pledged $60 million to it.

As of now, the main sponsor of IPL is DLF, which will shell out Rs 200 crore over the next five years. Hero Honda has extended its IPL sponsorship for five years.

IPL plans to acquire five other sponsors, from areas such as insurance, banking, telecom, automobile and retail.

The IPL Twenty20 tournament matches will start from April 18, 2008. The tournament will comprise 59 matches that will be played over 45 days.

Meanwhile, advertising rates for the IPL Twenty 20 tournament are soaring off the charts. SET Max, IPL’s official TV channel has completed 75% of its slot for rates that were prevalent during the last World Cup. SET Max is optimistic that it will collect Rs 300 crore in revenues for the IPL Twenty20 Tournament. It has already pencilled in commitments worth Rs 220 crore.

The presenting sponsor of the IPL Twenty20 tournament is Vodafone, which has shelled out Rs 32-35 crore. Four other co-sponsors include Coca Cola, Max New York, Hyundai and Godrej for a sum in the range of of Rs 18-25 crore.

According to news reports, BCCI even had Les Burdett, Australian curator of the Adelaide Oval, flown in to talk to the curators of the IPL pitches. Curators from eight cities of the country attended the seminar.

Though it is not known what kind of pitches would be prepared for the IPL tournament, it is thought that the pitches would be batsmen-friendly – the sixes and the fours attract more crowds. Indian pitches have been traditionally very flat, spinner-friendly and flat tracks. It remains to be seen how the IPL pitches would be.

First and the foremost reason why the BCCI could launch a third IPL auction is that Australia has now postponed their tour of Pakistan; and a number of players who were not available for round 1 and round 2 could turn up for the auction.

The second reason for a potential third round of IPL auction is that as the popularity of IPL has increased and the tournament has attained a reputation, many foreign players are now likely to ditch their cricket boards and knock on the doors of IPL. Cricket boards like the England cricket board could see an increasing pressure from the players to join IPL.

Cricket Australia and Pakistan Cricket Board chairmen will meet in Dubai later this month to discuss the new fixtures.

There have been allegations that the boards were conspiring to enable players take part in the IPL, reportedly under pressure from the BCCI.

Almost a dozen people were feared killed on Tuesday at Lahore’s when a bomb ripped through the office of Pakistan’s premier investigation agency, underscoring Cricket Australia’s security concerns about the tour

The announcement came on the same day there was a lethal bombing in the Pakistan city of Lahore.

Australia’s last tour of Pakistan was in 1998.

IPL chairman and BCCI vice-president Lalit Modi said improving infrastructure would be the top priority for the BCCI, as it prepared to host the 2011 World Cup in India.

Lalit Modi also said BCCI’s promotional activities in rural areas and tier-2 cities have resulted in so many youngsters finding international spotlight, a reference to the rising Indian pacer Praveen Kumar and skipper M S Dhoni, who were part of the Indian ODI team which won the Commonwealth Bank series in Australia recently. “Skills and the results are there for all to see,” he said.

Indian skipper M S Dhoni fetched the maximum amount of $1.5 million in the IPL auction held in Mumbai’s Hilton hotel in February.

IPL is the brainchild of Lalit Modi to take on the rebel Indian Cricket League, bankrolled by the Essel Group. IPL starts on 18 April, 2008.